Monday, December 12, 2016

The LoftOpera experience is always an extreme one, in abandoned
industrial spaces that are steaming hot in the summer and
freezing cold in the winter. But that is also one of the elements that makes
this company so radically bold and unassumingly cutting edge. There is
something subversive and secret-society-like about walking your way through
deserted urban wastelands to look for an “OPERA” sign, of all things. Once
you finally get into the venue, the contrast between the rawness of the surroundings
and the superb artistic quality and sophistication of the performance is a
thing of sublime beauty – and this time more than ever as they tackle their
most ambitious project to date.

That comforting secret society signPhoto credit: Allegri con fuoco

The indie company had initially announced Kurt Weil’s Mahoganny
as their December show, but thank goodness something made them change their
minds and they switched to Verdi’s Macbeth instead. Weil is interesting
but Verdi is just grand.

But how do you do grand opera in a factory on a budget and still
deliver? We could describe the sets, costumes, clever use of the space,
projections, staging ideas, which were all very nice, but what truly made this
show memorable was the music, performed by a stellar cast and a tight
orchestra, led by maestro and music director Sean Kelly. Every singer on
stage was extraordinary, from the leads to the chorus. I don’t know how they
managed to assemble such a top-notch group across the board. Even big houses
like the Met usually cast a mixed bag of singers where if you’re lucky the good
ones make you forget the mediocre or bad ones. In this case LoftOpera truly
orchestrated a perfect musical storm.

Born to be MacbethPhoto credit: Robert Altman

Baritone Craig Irvin embodied Macbeth body and soul and
rendered him as a man completely and utterly possessed. With a clear, handsome
sound and impeccable Italian diction he intoned the Scot’s musical lines with
dark and commanding delivery that boomed through the cavernous space. Irvin is
a powerful singer-actor and from the moment he opened his mouth he had me
hooked and drew me into Macbeth’s downward spiral of power, ambition and
self-destruction. From our seats in the second row, he was Macbeth in his eyes,
the way he carried his brow, in his mouth framed by a very fitting beard, down
to the core of his being. This is not an easy role and Irvin not only delivered
it but he also made it his own in a raging, almost diabolical way. It seems
like this run is a role debut for him, which makes it even more impressive that
he could embody it so brilliantly.

In director’s Laine Rettmer’s take, the tables are turned
from the more common interpretation where it is Lady Macbeth who pushes her
husband to evil deeds. This production introduces, during the overture, a
backstory where the Macbeths lost their young son, which seems to suggest that
grief and childlessness are some of the propelling forces here, and perhaps
Lady M bears more of the burden than her husband.

The sexual politics are reversedPhoto credit: Robert Altman

In fact, here it is Macbeth
who pushes his wife to suicide during his Pietà, rispetto, amore. In
this pathos invoking aria of realization and reflection on his guilt and the
futility of his plans, he pushes a huge rock across the rear of the stage
space, with his wife perched on top in the midst of her final breakdown. She
commits suicide while he reflects on the vicissitudes of his fate. He came
across as the more diabolical one, which was reinforced by other little
directorial choices. Rather than focus on the indelible stains on his hands,
this Macbeth wore Duncan’s blood stained stole as a royal accessory (instead of
the traditional crown). As a symbol of his bloodguilt, the stole becomes a
voluntary reminder that he could easily get rid of, yet he wears it with a
certain hubristic pride. The deep dark pride of Irvin’s voice also vividly
elevated this characteristic take on the story, not to mention his profound
acting chops.

Lady Macbeth responds to the letterPhoto credit: Robert Altman

Soprano Elizabeth Baldwin as Lady Macbeth was vocally
electrifying and delivered her several show-stopping scenes with gusto, power
and agility. Her soprano has dark undertones and the wide range required for
this role. In her opening Vieni t’affretta she truly gave it her all and
held certain final notes for what seemed longer than usual, in an impressive
virtuoso display. In the drinking song Si colmi il calice she was
delightful and graciously balanced the joyful tune with the efforts to reign in
her hallucinating husband. And her sleepwalking aria Una macchia è qui
tuttora was cookoo and almost child-like. Generally, Baldwin’s acting came
across as less aggressive than usual for this role, in line with the production’s
take where she lost her child and her husband is the more evil of the couple.

Bass Kevin Thompson as Banco was spectacular and possibly
one of the most handsome and effortlessly powerful bass voices I have ever
heard live. He reminds me of Rene Pape but with warmer and sexier undertones.
Thompson’s instrument is smooth, deeply melodic and just hypnotically
enthralling. And strong, oh so strong. I was sad to see him die so early in Act II as I just could not
get enough of him. He was a commanding grounding force in the initial duet with
Macbeth and delivered his last aria Come dal ciel precipita before
getting assassinated with heart-wrenching and chilling effects. He also strikes
a humble, caring presence when he dons the hat of father to his son in
the culmination of Act II. This is a singer to watch out for.

The ensemble cast was killerPhoto credit: Robert Altman

Another terrific singer I wished had more to do was tenor Peter
Scott Drackley as Macduff. While he had truly only one big aria, Ah, la
paterna mano, he delivered it as though his life depended on it while he
grieved over his family murdered by Macbeth. With perfect Italian, soaring
expressivity and a clean sound, he created one of those moments where time
stopped, and tears streamed down my face.

The chorus of witches unleashedPhoto credit: Robert Altman

The chorus was top notch, too, particularly in the Act I finale Schiudi
inferno where it asks God to punish Duncan’s death. You could feel the
emotions tingling in the soles of your feet, in your legs and running up your
spine. It was spectacularly chilling, just as a true Macbeth should be.
And in Act IV’s opening Patria oppressa, the chorus was magnificently
moving in this patriotic bit Verdi snuck in (nothing to do with the
Shakespearean original but hey it’s the Risorgimento in Italy).

Lady M tries again to wash her hands cleanPhoto credit: Robert Altman

When it came to staging, the production made a great use of the
MAST chocolate factory cathedral-like space. The sets per se amounted to little
more than two rock-like structures strewn with moss, but the stairs that led to
the upper level of the facility were equally used, as were the walls (for
projections, mostly in the prophecy scene). Also, I particularly enjoyed how
the group of witches emerged from the cavernous back of the “stage,” literally
as ghostly figures emerging from darkness. A simple yet very impactful effect.

Yes, the venue lacked heating (I felt for Lady M when she poured a
carafe of bloody water over herself in Act IV), but as we walked out into the
industrial navy yard with the skyline glistening under the snow, we could only
feel exhilaration. Because when Macbeth is done so well it’s just so damn good.

Going into Rossini’s L’italiana in Algeri, I was ready for
some pure escapist entertainment. It is, after all, Rossini in all of his early
opera buffa glory. What I didn't brace myself for was the absolute
timeliness of the piece. In it, an ultra wealthy man abuses his power and status
to grope and fondle any woman he wishes. The plot was all too close to the
scene unfolding on the national political stage.

The production takes us back to the good old days with PonnellePhoto credit: Met Opera

But it was still an unplug-and-have-fun kind of evening,
nevertheless. Just let the music and vocal acrobatics wash over you. Silly,
yes, but so pleasurable. Like a bubbly, exotic cocktail you can’t get enough
of. The Met’s long-standing easy-breezy production dates back to the more
traditional (but no less boisterous) days of the great Jean-Pierre Ponnelle.
It is minimal enough in its period detail to provide many fluid changes of
scene, but the elephantine stage felt too big for the charming scale of the
mad-capped action.

Ildar steals the show with his sultanesque shenanigansPhoto credit: Met Opera

The outstanding Russian baritone Ildar Abdrazakov as the bey
Mustafà stole the show – not only was he hilarious, but he sounded great too.
He literally chewed the scenery to shreds with his zany take on the crazy
sultan, right down to his feverish finale as a new recruit to the ranks of the
illustrious Pappataci. I've never seen such an energetic performance on stage at
the Met. He was straight out of a cartoon and clearly having a lot of fun playing the self-absorbed, sex-driven, capricious, exuberant bey.

Lindoro holds fast to his romantic tiesPhoto credit: Met Opera

Tenor René Barbera filled his role as the pining lover
Lindoro with warmth and grace (which was particularly appreciated after hearing
the tenor in Tell). His Languir per una bella caught me off guard
as it often does – the tender hearted nucleus of the first act that it is. So
nice.

Soprano Marianna Pizzolato was vocally solid too, though
she seemed to be missing that certain sparkle and maybe came off bit too
matronly, though in many regards she is the one figure who actually grounds the
piece. The other three male leads are merely satellites in orbit around her
gravitational pull. So the matronly may not be entirely misguided.

The matronly gravitational center of the piece exerts her pullPhoto credit: Met Opera

You could not help but smile and often just burst into bellyful
laughs. Billed as Rossini’s first big breakout piece, L’italiana is
truly irresistible bel canto. I
rather prefer Il turco in Italia – with its more dynamic, less schematic
plot – but come on, really, who can resist Rossini when he’s at his opera
buffa best?

It's back to the beloved patria for these wayward soulsPhoto credit: Met Opera

*
* *

Rossini’s Guillaume Tell (1829)

MetropolitanOpera

October 21, 2016

Time for a very dramatic change of pace, but this is still RossiniPhoto credit: Met Opera

Less than a week later and we found ourselves back at the Met for
another helping of Rossini's genius. After seeing his first big hit, it was
time to see the last opera he would ever compose, the august and profoundly
dramatic, Guillaume Tell. You really couldn't conjure a starker
opposition. These two operas are really like night and day.

The Met’s new production by Pierre Audi was neither here
nor there. Guillaume Tell is a timeless story about a marginalized
people rising up against oppression but the costumes were all over the place
and made it distracting to really get into the emotions of this story that is
so full of hope. Guillaume looked like Obi Wan Kenobi from the initial Star
Wars franchise and together with the abstract sets it seemed like maybe
they were going for a sparse modern Druid à la Norma kind of thing, in
Ikea-looking raw lumber framed houses. But then some bits were futuristic. Costumes
ran the gamut from Shakespearean wench to nineteenth-century garden-party dandy
to dominatrix to Nazi officer. Then all of a sudden the world was divided into
those who wear linen and those who wear black leather. The whole thing was hard to
pin down. With visual touches that were added as mere symbols like the hull of
the boat that recalls the shape of the bow that Tell will use to save the day.
All in all, the production did very little for me.

The new production is all Star Wars meets IkeaPhoto credit: Met Opera

In the title role, Canadian bass-baritone Gerard Finley came
out a little cold for me. He didn't have the forceful muscularity that
I look for in his duet Ou vais tu in the first act. His accompaniment
should give Arnauld a basso ostinato ground that is deep and full against which
the young lover can dance his fanciful ear-candy melody. It is one of my
favorite duets in the opera, not least of all because it bears certain
similarities with a number from Rossini’s earlier Otello, which I rank
as one of the greatest overlooked gems at the top of his oeuvre. But by Act
III, Finley had warmed up. His Sois immobile (to his son, right before aiming at the famous apple) was extremely moving.

The lovers meet across enemy linesPhoto credit: Met Opera

Soprano Marina Rebekah as Mathilda was out of this world.
She is bright and agile and strikes a commanding stage presence. Tenor Bryan
Hymel may have been proficient technically but he has a high-pitched sound
that I found grating and annoying. I cringed when he opened his mouth for most
of the evening. It sounded like he had a frog stuck in his throat. Maybe it
wasn't his night, though he seemed to be quite warmly received by the rest of
the audience. He really wasn't doing it for me.

It's all linen versus leather, all of a suddenPhoto credit: Met Opera

Rossini’s use of the chorus is utterly striking. In the first
half of the opera the chorus is all hippie happy in their celebration of their provincial
lifestyle as an open-air mountain loving people. The joy is palpable in those
first movements, which is what makes it extra poignant that Rossini’s third act
ballet takes the form of an exhibition of dominatrixes and domination. The
female cronies of the Habsburg tyrant lash and whip the poor peasants forcing
them to party till they drop. The palpable choral joy of the previous acts gets
pushed to exhaustion, crisis and collapse. Many people sitting in our section
thought it was too long, overly extravagant, done to death. But that is exactly
the point. Rossini very effectively does the poor oppressed peasants to death.

As the great bel canto
composer’s swan song, Guillaume Tell is grandiose, complex, deep. It's
hard to believe that less than two decades later Tell could come from
the same pen that produced L’italiana in Algeri. Little Gioachino is all
grown up. There are just so many more layers at play here. Melody and vocal
acrobatics are not just virtuosic ends in themselves but are actually used to
express emotions and to tell a compelling story of profound socio-political
importance. Its pervasive nationalistic sentiment provides another link to a
brief jingoistic interlude toward the end of L’italiana in Algeri. The same spirit will go on to pervade
the works of the later Verdi as well. In fact, Rossini’s use of the chorus as a
true character of the opera made me think of some of the innovations Verdi
brings to his haunting and unique Giovanna D’Arco.

Sois immobile! In other words: Be still!Photo credit: Met Opera

And of course the Tell overture is such a blockbuster and
so much fun and electrifying, that I could just not sit still. So much so that when
it was pouring rain after the show, we had to forego our usual stroll
home and took the subway instead. On the platform, the resident sax player was
bringing down the post-show house by playing bits from that very same overture,
which was more joyous fun. I was still shaking it to the endlessly recycled
melodies of Rossini’s immortal genius.

All in all, the opera was very long but it was nevertheless pretty
action packed so it never felt weighed down. Actually, the first act kind of
sets the stage and after that there was a whole slew of plot developments
that kept me on the edge of my seat. So much going on in the narrative, so many
musical ideas and so much dramatic tension. It is a very enjoyable opera. I only
wish the production delivered on its new Met production promise.

Richard Strauss’s Salome is a rollercoaster ride of a
sexual coming of age story. The eponymous heroine is a spoiled brat who refuses
to return the love of the captain who throws himself at her feet. She is
burdened by the misplaced erotically charged attentions of King Herod, her
stepfather. Yet she gets all caught up in an unrequited love story with the
king’s prized prisoner, Jochanaan, or John the Baptist. In the current cast
at the Met’s revival of a production that dates back to 2004 and the dawn of
the war in Iraq, Željko Lučić
sings him with mellifluous prophetic power (and not, as the character is more
often portrayed, as a brutal monster).

Salome takes us to a deep and dark place with her longing to have
her affection returned and then with a subsequent desire for senseless revenge.
In the Bible, the wishes of her mother are what she is seeking to fulfill. In
Strauss’ opera, thanks in large part to Oscar Wilde, the perverse “coming of
age” of a twisted young woman, who grew up in an immoral court of self-indulgence
and general dissolution, is what blossoms massively to the fore. The Salome of
the opera is a privileged little lady who is accustomed to getting what she
wants particularly from the men in her life. She is the apple of every man’s
eye (or so she thinks) and so when she meets a man who refuses to give her the
time of day she ends up feeling particularly spurned.

The Dance of Seven Veils in drag.Photo credit: Ken Howard

Her desire for revenge leads her to disobey her mother’s orders
and agree to perform a spirit-lifting strip tease for her lascivious lord and
stepfather. Here her “Dance of the Seven Veils” is a gender bending Marlene
Dietrich-inspired choreography. Salome comes out in drag – a very Wilde a move.
Dressed like a man, in a top hat, tuxedo vest and pants, she taunts her easy
audience with her titillating routine. From our cheap seats it was far from
clear how revealing she went, but apparently she went all the way. Which is
only fitting for the symbolic gesture it is meant to represent. Herod gave his
word and if she expects to hold him to it, she needs to stick to hers.

Salome always gets her man.Photo credit: Ken Howard

Patricia Racette
isn’t the huge Wagnerian soprano you might come to expect for a role that has
to sing out over Strauss’s superlative orchestration. She is seductive, though
more fickle than impulsive and more nonplussed than obsessed as the spoiled
young princess. She gave us both a physically revealing performance as well as
an emotionally raw one between the dance of the seven veils and her slow,
steady decline over the head of her conquest once her wish is granted.
Nevertheless, her emotional range was dainty and more delicate about her
obsession, and she was far from maniacal (as the character is more typically
depicted). As a result, Racette’s Salome came off less unhinged and more out of
touch with the reality of her actions and their consequences. In my book it is
still a valid reading and a strikingly fresh one. The whole score comes off
sunnier and more palatable. Some of the truly dark and dingy takes on the piece
can really take you in a jaunt through the gutter of the female psyche. This Salome
was slightly more relatable, if that is even possible, almost as a normalized
monster.

Gerhard Siegel as Herod is that
big forceful Wagnerian voice you might expect. He was both commanding and
pathetic. He could project out over the orchestra especially in his moments of
desperation.

Under the direction of Johannes Debus, the orchestra
brought Strauss’s picturesque score vividly to life. He evinced cinematic
sounds from every twist and turn of the musical landscape with its exotic oboe
motif. The score is very interesting and it has a continuous flow that keeps
you on the edge of your seat. But tonight’s performance greatly toned down the
frenetic oddities of the score, the weird stuff that has often made Salome
seem like a strange mess to me. The whole take on the opera was more sober.

The pastiche of a production.Photo credit: Ken Howard

Jürgen Flimm’s production isn’t
entirely convincing as it really is a hodgepodge of disjointed elements. On one
end there are futuristic stairs that seem to have been borrowed from the neighboring Apple Store.
On the other half of the stage, desert hills that are cartoonishly majestic.
The decadence of Herod’s court is coded as decisively colonial if not downright
western. The prisoner is kept in an oil well? A mine shaft? Or just a well for water? The captain kills
himself with a firearm. The revelers all swill champagne from bottles that bear contemporary
labels that could have been bought at any nearby liquor store. The revival of recent
experiments in Euro-trash levels of Regietheater like this one, which hasn’t aged terribly well, is a testament to the transitory nature of this directorial
style. No matter how open I am to stimulating new takes on the classics, it
begins to feel like our Regietheater days are numbered at the Met.
Investments in longer lived concepts may be in order so long as the life span
of a new production has to be as long as a decade or two.

Sunday, December 4, 2016

The Met’s new production of Puccini’s first big
breakthrough opera from 1893 is back for its second year in a row with a new
cast. When we saw this production on the opening night of its run last winter, Roberto
Alagna had stepped in to save the day due to an “unexpected” cancellation
by the chronic canceller Jonas Kaufmann, opposite the gorgeous Latvian
soprano Kristine Opolais. Back then it was our first Manon Lescaut
and we liked it fine, though we did not feel it was something worth writing
home about. This year, maybe because of the new (superior) cast or due to some
Wagnerian exposure, we actually liked this Puccini highly melodramatic opera
much better.

Manon unleashes her divaPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

With the new cast, the dynamic tension between
the characters shifted ever so slightly. Carlos Alvarez brought out his
rich and lyric tenore spinto. His voice is vibrant and fits squarely in
the Puccini canon. He played a cocky, headstrong des Grieux, with his male
assertiveness coming across in his brutal attack on certain notes in key
dramatic moments. His No, pazzo son in the climax of Act
III turned out to be one of the most moving moments of the evening. I found that
the threat of separation between the two lovers tugged on my heartstrings.
Alvarez’s performance was gripping and the fact that I was virtually moved to
tears completely blind-sided me. I usually find Puccini too sentimental, too
saccharine, too sappy for my tastes, and yet he still manages to sneak up on me
especially during scenes like this one that feature big bursts of muscular
emotions set to music.

When it comes to Anna
Netrebko, it seems like she was born to sing this role. There is something
about the way she embodies Manon that seems at first blush to be entirely out
of character but that ultimately brings to the fore elements that you don’t
usually see from other singers. While Netrebko and her voice seem a touch too
mature for the Act I incarnation of this innocent country maiden who is on her
way to a convent, she played her Manon as a
fresh faced ingénue who was completely unaware of the innate diva-esque powers
of seduction that she naturally possesses. It was a revelation in many ways,
not least of all because she owned the role vocally, even while only feigning
innocent naïveté. So by injecting her larger than life diva quality even in
these nascent moments of Manon’s early blossoming, Netrebko endowed the
character with something very special, not to mention fitting for what this
young woman may in part also be deep down.

Manon possesses her inner divaPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

In the first act, she discovers what she is
capable of. In the second, she finds herself in a quandary of sorts. Having
been forced by her opportunistic brother to leave the man whom she really
loves, she uses her natural gifts to carve out a very posh niche for herself in
the rarified Parisian world of the rich and famous in which she seems to serve
as little more than a glorified whore. Clad in her plush full-length furs and
surrounded by a slew of Art Deco luxuries, Netrebko dreamily croons In
quelle trine morbide about missing the simpler life she enjoyed with des
Grieux, her more passionate lover, the man whom she abandoned without even
saying goodbye. She pines for those times when she had fewer toys but soaked up
a whole lot more love, long kisses and amorous embraces.

In this case, Manon is actively a trickster. She knows exactly
what she is doing when she manipulates des Grieux back into her embrace in Act
II. She is a dangerous seductress using the only weapon in her arsenal as femme
fatale, and that is her antico fascino che accieca. Poor des Grieux immediately
falls for it, to his own knowing chagrin. Netrebko plays the moment
beautifully. A slippery snake who knows the power she holds over men. Des
Grieux then really sees through her deceit and artifice when she reverts back
to her opportunistic materialist self after they are alerted that her arrest is
imminent. Rather than high tail it out of there, she goes back to her boudoir
for the jewels and the gold, and Alvarez breaks into one of his most heart
wrenching numbers in the first half of the opera, Ah, Manon, mi tradisce il
tuo folle pensier, which he belts out with a manly desperation. She
continues to play him and he is distraught. It is in moments like this one that
makes me think that Puccini really nailed it. This whole movement in the music
and the narrative very concisely captures the spirit of Prévost’s novel, in
which Manon is a cold blooded heartbreaker and des Grieux let's his crush get
the better of him at every turn, yet he just can't help himself, and so he
always goes back for more. Crazy he is indeed.

The Column of Trajan and the painting visible in the boudoir backdropPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

Set against the backdrop of a Nazi occupied
France, Richard Eyre’s distinctive take on the opera opens in Amiens,
France, only this time the year is 1941. The village of the original has been
transformed into a provincial French township and the fashion has been adapted
to match. On the whole the updated setting enlivens the story, despite
initially feeling like another futile experiment in the modern history of
operatic Regietheater. Upon further reflection, however, some of these
directorial decisions do in fact add several insightful layers to the story as
it stands. Not only does it come off completely sexed up – the costumes and
sets look great – but it also introduces deeper motivations for such plot
points as to why Manon is headed to a convent in Act I and as to why the
arrival of the gendarmes in Act II is extra heartbreaking, not to mention the
deportation twist in Act III.

Manon flirts with her sugar daddyPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

Talking with a scholar of French literature and culture during one
of the intermissions, I was taken by a particular insight that sheds some light
on how we might go about decoding some of the liberties Richard Eyretook
with this concept, especially considering the bold decision to set the opera in
a France under German occupation in the year 1941, rather than the late 18th
century (the novel is set in the first half of the 18th century, Puccini moves
it to the second half of that century). The suggestion is that Manon is Jewish
and like many rural Jewish girls of the time she is being shipped off to a
convent in order to escape persecution – a relatively common occurrence. Then
in Act II when the soldiers burst in to abscond with her, it is because Geronte
has not merely denounced her for lechery, but rather that he has reported her
Jewishness to the authorities. And so in barge the Nazis. A particularly cruel
form of revenge for having found her in the midst of a tryst with her former
lover and his prior rival. It’s a very powerful reading, and it very likely is
what the director and his team were going for.

Not every aspect of the production fits into this reading and for
it to work at all you have to use your imagination, particularly in Act IV. But
the broad outlines of this notion seem to be there, and the direction makes
every attempt to make it all mesh. The Act III role of the prostitutes and
prisoners who are being shipped off as slave laborers to the new world would
then seem to provide a parallel to the rounding up of individuals to be sent
off to concentration camps. In fact, they are all systematically stripped down
one-by-one during the humiliating roll call portion of the act and dressed in
sad gray smocks with numbers stenciled on them, so Holocaust references would
not be a stretch.

The Nazi deportation forces cart her off to the campsPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

By the time we get to the final act, however, Eyre’s staging of
Act IV only functions on the level of metaphor. The lovers find themselves in a
wasteland, both the work of their all-consuming passion and of the war that has
been raging on in the meantime. This is one of the main points in which the
words being sung in the Italian are incongruous to the action on stage, and I
usually find this practice harder to condone. The long slow death of the
beloved nevertheless plays out against the backdrop of a war-ravaged cityscape
and, when sung by the likes of Alvarez and Netrebko, it is a harrowing
experience for all involved. An appropriately Wagnerian finale, a Liebestod
in the Italian fashion, as Puccini intended it.

The slithery snake sneaks up on her preyPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

Rob Howell’s signature rotund
set design (with striking similarities to his work in the Met’s current
productions of Carmen and Le nozze di Figaro) cleverly includes
in Manon’s courtesan quarters in Act II a mock up of the Column of Trajan in
Rome that features an array of Kama Sutra poses and a screen with an enormous
image of Cupid pinching Venus’ nipple from the iconic painting by Agnolo
Branzino, The Allegory of Venus and Cupid. The part of the painting that is on full display includes the right side of the composition in which the monstrous figure of Temptation holds forth in one hand the promise of love and pleasure in the form of a honeycomb; in the other she holds the menacing prick of her scorpion tail. These elements provide a kinky backdrop against which Manon's big courtesan scene unfolds. It displays clues to the pain that will inevitably follow in the wake of love's great transitory pleasure, especially as these two lovers sing of lips that wound and heal – dolcissimo soffrir, indeed!

The set for this act must also include a great big bed and this
makes Puccini powerfully unique. The libretto and the writing are among the
most Dionysian outside of Wagner, but Puccini is Italian and so the quality is
distinctly more warm-blooded. Just to read the text for the big love scene when
des Grieux and Manon are reunited is to go on a trip to Venusberg that is not
otherworldly, but profoundly of the here and now. It’s deep, if you let it work
its magic on you. It can be a bit misleading for its verismo undertones,
but to understand Manon Lescaut, it seems to me that you have to know
not only Cavalleria rusticana, but also Tannhäuser and maybe even
Tristan und Isolde, which makes it a perfect pairing for this season at
the Met.

The wasteland provides the backdrop for the final movementPhoto credit: Ken Howard/Met Opera

Manon Lescaut’s Act
II contains one of the deepest most Dionysian expressions of operatic
abandonment in the Italian canon that I have seen. And it is only thanks to
Wagner (of all people) that I have come to this understanding. This opera can
take you places if you let it and it does contain raw bits of the Puccini works
to come. The beginning gives you a glimpse of what is to come in the first act
of La boheme. Act III gives you a glimpse of the winning formula that
brought us the E lucevan le stelle movementin Tosca. And
there are other prolepses of what is to come in Puccini’s later work. But his
attempt to descend into the Dionysian in the second half of Act II and what
happens in Act IV all amount to something very deep. This is not Verdi, and
it’s not Wagner, nor is it the later Puccini. Richard Eyre’s production does
not entirely disappoint.